Paradise Hotel 2 debuts tonight on My Network TV and Fox Reality

Paradise Hotel 2, the fun and trashy reality competition that has lots more drinking and hooking up than coherent rules, returns tonight. The show airs on My Network TV at 9 p.m. ET, and then a late-night, TV-MA version of the same episode airs at 1 a.m. ET/10 p.m. PT on the Fox Reality Channel.

The show has a simple concept but is hard to describe because it seems so pointless. It starts with 11 people, five men and six women, and has them pair up. The odd woman out gets eliminated unless she can break up one of the other couples, and then a brand-new man will join the cast and try to find his own roommate. That, of course, results in back-stabbing, drama, and

Along the way, the game will change as producers make up random twists, but the big change this year is that the show isn’t airing live, meaning that new contestants haven’t been watching the others on TV. But host Amanda Byram says that because the exiting cast members will leave letters for their replacements, the effect is the same.

I’ve seen the first episode, and while it starts slowly, the producers seem to have found a good mix of people who are concerned with nothing more than drinking and hooking up, although they do take a detour to strip down to their underwear and dancing. Actual making out starts relatively soon, and so does the back-stabbing, thankfully.

about Andy Dehnart

Andy Dehnart is a journalist who has covered reality television for more than 15 years and created reality blurred in 2000. A member of the Television Critics Association, his writing and criticism about television, culture, and media has appeared on NPR and in Playboy, Vulture, and many other publications. Andy, 38, also directs the journalism program at Stetson University in Florida, where he teaches creative nonfiction and journalism. He has an M.F.A. in nonfiction writing and literature from Bennington College. More about reality blurred and Andy.

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reality blurred is regularly updated with reality TV news; behind-the-scenes reports; interviews with reality TV show cast members and producers; and recaps and reviews of reality TV shows including Survivor, Big Brother, The Amazing Race, The Bachelor, Project Runway, The Voice, Top Chef, and many more.